


and if we make it 'til then (the next ten minutes)

by sharoncarters



Category: Legacies (TV 2018)
Genre: F/M, idiots to lovers, landon: please god send me the nicest angel you have, lightning flashes; lizzie cackles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-28
Updated: 2019-02-28
Packaged: 2019-11-07 05:30:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17954462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sharoncarters/pseuds/sharoncarters
Summary: "Everyone in Lizzie’s life chooses Hope over her. She’s tired of being surprised by it." / Lizzie and Landon have more in common than she's willing to admit, and maybe that's not such a bad thing after all.





	and if we make it 'til then (the next ten minutes)

**Author's Note:**

> this definitely got out of hand and i spent waayyy too long on it for a couple of characters who have interacted maybe 5 times in the entire show. i am what i am

Will you share your life with me for the next ten minutes?  
For the next ten minutes we can handle that.  
We could watch the waves, we could watch the skies,  
Or just sit and wait as the time ticks by.  
And if we make it ‘til then can I ask you again for another ten?  
\- Jeremy Jordan and Laura Osnes, The Next Ten Minutes Ago

 

* * *

 

 

Lizzie doesn’t have a lot of things in common with other people. It’s one of the reasons she doesn’t have many friends, besides Josie (who is essentially... _legally obligated_ to be her friend), and MG, who is her friend in spite of her qualities, not because of them.

So it comes as a shocking (dare she say, disgusting) twist of fate that Lizzie comes to realize she actually has a lot in common with Landon Kirby. They’re both the background characters in their own lives, playing second fiddle to Hope Mikaelson, abandoned by mothers they never knew, neither with supernatural powers of their own to fight back with. 

So just maybe, in the end, all of this was inevitable.

 

* * *

 

Another day, another fight with Hope. Lizzie wishes that there was something she could do to immunize herself from Hope for the rest of time. Seriously, she can’t escape the girl. No matter where she goes, there’s Hope, infiltrating her life over and over and over again. Her dad’s office? Hope’s there. All of her classes? Present. She’s even in their room sometimes now, too, because apparently she’s Josie’s new best friend. Lizzie feels like she has whiplash, her head constantly snapping around waiting for Hope to appear and ruin her day all over again. 

Surely there has to be some sort of magical switch that she can flip so that all of Hope’s insults, her accomplishments, everything that makes Hope so special and so much better than Lizzie roll right off like they mean nothing. It’s not like Lizzie’s a vampire; she can’t just switch off her humanity that easily. (Not that she’d want to, anyway. She just wants to get rid of the bad, not the good, too. The bad just happens to be distilled into a single human being, short and snarky and much, _much_ prettier than her.)

Instead, Lizzie’s so deeply affected by it all that it makes her do the thing she hates most: lose control. It never has to be something big, either, to set her off. It’s not like Hope runs around being a hero 24/7—she does have to stop and eat and go to class sometimes, too. Not that Lizzie’s ever seen her do those things. 

It’s sitting in class with her that does it. Lizzie can’t help it. It’s just—does Hope have to be an overachiever all the freaking time? Lizzie does everything, and she tries _so hard_ ; she really does. And yet all of her trying just doesn’t hold a candle to Hope Mikaelson: child prodigy, raised and trained by the original witches, vampires, and werewolves of the supernatural world. Lizzie wants to gag. 

How is Lizzie supposed to compete with that? She doesn’t even have any magic of her own! Sitting in class with Hope, while the auburn-haired girl performs every spell, every action to perfection, how is anyone, let alone Lizzie, supposed to compete? She just can’t. So Lizzie does the only thing that she knows how to do: she lashes out. She siphons magic from her desk, because ( _duh_ ) every single thing in a school for the supernatural has some trace of magic in it, and she spells Hope’s notebook to slap her across the face.

The book doesn’t hit her hard. It’s not like Lizzie wants to maim the girl (much). She’s just frustrated, and angry, and jealous. She’s always jealous, because no matter how much Hope may talk about loss, she has everything that Lizzie’s ever wanted. 

Of course Hope knows exactly who did it, as does the professor. It’s not the first time Lizzie’s done something like this. If there’s anything that Lizzie’s known for, it’s her temper. (Her fashion sense, too, as long as Penelope Park isn’t in the room. But that’s the thing, isn’t it? She’s never number one, just the backup.) Consequently, Lizzie gets sent out of the classroom fuming, _this close_ to tears, and losing control. Typical. 

Lizzie hates this feeling _so much_ ; the angry, bitter bubbling in her chest, the thoughts in her headso sickening that she barely recognizes herself—so it comes as no shock that when she’s at her lowest, Landon Kirby would come strolling in to the corner of the library (not Stefan’s, but the old, ugly one, the one only Lizzie visits because she knows no one will ever find her there) that Lizzie is currently tearing apart. She’s mere seconds from spearing a letter opener into his eye, but misdirects and ends up hitting the wall next to him with moments to spare. 

“Watch where you’re going!” she snaps at him, panting from the exertion of her freakout. All around them lay hundreds of scattered papers, a ripped up couch, and Lizzie’s own schoolbooks, flipped open facedown from where she’d thrown them against the wall. “I could’ve maimed you!”

“Jesus,” Landon breathes, his grey eyes wide and blinking furiously. “Why is that not the first time a girl’s ever said that to me?”

Lizzie doesn’t even bother stopping herself from rolling her eyes. “Is there any particular reason you’re here, or did you and Hope just conspire to make my day that much worse?”

Landon blinks again. _Jesus_ , he’s thick. His mouth parts to retort, and Lizzie’s already rolling her eyes (again; he’s going to make them pop out of her skull) when he says, “Hope has nothing to do with it, actually. Or with me.” He looks sad and broody, but then again, when doesn’t he? Lizzie doesn’t know much about her uncle Stefan, but she figures this must have been the look that got even her own mother to fall in love with him. 

“Wow,” Lizzie laughs, trying to tame her hair with both hands, leaning against the nearest bookshelf and crossing her arms. “Who knew our supreme Tribrid leader actually had taste.” In her head she thinks that maybe if Hope stopped pushing people away, she’d stop whining about all that she’s lost and finally focus on what’s right in front of her. Lizzie would never say that to the girl, though. She’s had enough shunning to last a lifetime. 

Landon shoves his hands deep into the pockets of the jacket that he definitely doesn’t need to be wearing indoors. “Does it make you feel better to make fun of people,” he snaps back at her, “or are you just that uncreative?”

“Aw, cute,” Lizzie sneers. “Little human has a mouth on him.” She means it as a joke, of course. She couldn’t care less if he has powers or not. It’s not like she’s one to brag in the supernatural department, either. But Lizzie does have a talent when it comes to one thing, and that thing is _digging_. She is almost too good at pinpointing someone’s weakness and using it against them, digging the knife in so deep with her words that they never see it coming. (The downside of this is that she often does it to herself: one’s biggest critic is oneself, or whatever.)

“So are you, you know,” Landon says quietly. _No_ , Lizzie thinks. _We’re both animals in cages, clawing at our own skin_. She wonders what would happen if she raked her fingers down his chest—would he be as gooey in the center as he is on the outside, all pouty lips and sad, sad eyes? 

He seems almost angry about it, and of course Lizzie knows why. Being surrounded by people more powerful than you on a daily basis really starts to work its way into your psyche. She knows it from firsthand experience. She just wishes he didn’t look so sad when he said it, to the point where she almost feels bad for him. 

“Am I?” she asks, and she can see the way Landon’s eyes shutter, the almost imperceptible way his shoulders slump forward. He offers no retort, just shakes his head as he turns his back to her and leaves the library.

It’s only after she hears the door click does Lizzie drop her snippy facade and let herself sink down to the floor. She curls up into a ball and buries her head in her knees, letting the tears that she’s been holding back fall, and sobs until she can’t anymore. And then she picks herself up, wipes her eyes, and goes to work on cleaning up the mess that she’s created.

 

* * *

 

_“Josie,” Lizzie whispers in the dark. She is fourteen years old, depressed, and hates herself and everyone around her. Mom’s gone again. It seems like mom is always gone these days, and Hope Mikaelson is there in her place, filling Lizzie with hate and anger instead of love and confidence._

_Josie’s in her own bed, quiet. They don’t usually sleep apart, but it’s summer, and it’s sticky hot at the school despite all of the cooling charms the witches have been placing on it lately._

_“Yeah?” Josie whispers back. Lizzie knew she was still awake; it was a twin thing._

_“Have you ever been in love?”_

_A rustle, more silence. “You mean,” Josie starts, “someone I_ haven’t _told you about?”_

_“Yeah.”_

_“Not possible,” Josie says. “I tell you everything.”_

_“Do you think I’ll ever have it?” Lizzie asks Josie instead, ignoring the answer. Maybe it would be better if they had secrets between them, she didn’t know. She’s never had a normal. All she has is Josie. “What mom and Stefan had? Or dad and..._ her _?”_

_Josie flips over onto her side to look at her sister. Lizzie’s crying, and she doesn’t want Josie to know, but that’s also impossible: Josie always knows, even in the dark, even when Lizzie’s trying to hide it. “Liz,” her sister whispers. “What’s wrong?”_

_Lizzie doesn’t answer for a long time. “Everything,” she finally says, flopping over, onto her back.“Everything.”_

 

* * *

 

Landon mopes. He mopes as hard as he’s ever moped before, and that’s saying something. He doesn’t know why Hope broke up with him, he really doesn’t. Maybe it had eroded because of the passage of time, or because they never really had anything besides their shared inexperience and trauma in common, or maybe it’s because he realized that he would always love her more than she loved him. Whatever it was, he wished her the best, he really did. Landon wasn’t one to harbor ill will, even when the worst things happened to him. He’s had enough bad things to last him a lifetime. He’s given up on dwelling on it. 

He tried to forgive and forget, he really did. Which is why it seemed so surprising to his own subconscious that every time he talked to Lizzie Saltzman, he could neither forgive nor forget. Instead, he hyper-fixated on the things that she said, to an extreme that scared him. Did she really mean that last jab, was she serious during their last interaction, or is she just joking? He could never really get a read on her. No matter how hard Hope had always tried to conceal her emotions, she hadn’t been that good at it. Hope’s emotions spread across her face in tidal waves; she never was great at holding them back. It made that part of their relationship easier, at least. 

Lizzie is a whole other animal. He never understands what she’s trying to convey, and it irks him. The only time Landon ever knows what’s going on in her head is when she’s mad, and that doesn’t lead to good consequences for him. He considers going to Josie about it, but Josie has her own problems, and anyway he’s embarrassed about it. What would he even say? “Hey, Josie, your sister only ever gives me the time of day when she’s angry and I kind of think I like it.” That’s just not… something he’s willing to give up his dignity for. The small amount of it that he has left, anyway. 

So he just decides to leave it. The feelings would go away eventually, right? As long as they didn’t interact, it would be easy to just… ignore it. Until he no longer remembered why he was ignoring it. 

 

* * *

 

_Landon has only ever had Rafael. That’s how it is and how it always will be. Brothers in arms. Where I go, you follow._

_It’s just a shame that Rafael wasn’t there when Landon really needed him, when he was getting beat and enduring cigarettes being burned into his skin._

_“Dear God,” Landon prays, curled up in his closet, capital G because he’s young enough to think that that’ll change anything. “I don’t know what I did, but I’d really like to make it up to you.” Landon doesn’t know what an angel looks like, but he wants to meet one, just once. He doesn’t know if it’ll help, but he just wants it, so bad._

 

* * *

 

The first time Landon ever touches Lizzie, she’s three seconds away from getting into a fight. It’s not the first time that he’s ever _ever_ touched her, but it’s the first time he touches her on purpose. He’s touched her out of necessity, of course, like that time he thought she was infected by a mind-controlling slug. But it’s different now, this time. 

It’s like he senses it, her simmering rage, Josie’s ex-demon goading her into it. He sees them arguing across the common room, Lizzie’s face going red and blotchy with rage, her eyebrows downturned, and Penelope’s smirk so pronounced that he’d probably be able to recreate it in his sleep. 

Landon sidles over, appearing from the shadows like he always does, the fucking hot topic wannabe, and says, not at all smoothly, “Hey, ladies,” dragging the first word out uncomfortably long. His arm curls around the inside of Lizzie’s elbow, and it’s awful. She feels like she’s been branded by fire. “What’s going on over here?”

The worst part of it is that he annoys her so much that she’s actually calming down, or at least focusing her energy in another direction. She’s wearing a t-shirt, so she can feel the calluses on his palm and fingertips on her bare skin. It’s disgusting. Her forearms erupt in goosebumps. 

Penelope’s eyes flick down to where he’s touching her with the barest hint of interest, and Lizzie yanks her arm away. “Mind your own business, off-brand Damon Salvatore.” Penelope snorts, but Lizzie doesn’t pay her any mind, furiously storming her way to Emma’s office.

It’s only 10:30 am and her day has already had too many events for her to handle. She needs a pep talk and a power nap, and also, just maybe, a little babying. She deserves it. Her spelled bracelet has shocked her so many times that she thinks she might have nerve damage, and she’d been unsuccessful in getting it off. She’d had to go to Josie for help. And now she thinks maybe that’s why she’s reacting to Landon like this, because her neurons are off and she needs serious medical help. It’s the only explanation for her body completely betraying her brain. 

Landon watches her go, his eyes lingering slightly too long on the back of her head and also, maybe, her butt. He’s going to plead the fifth on that one. 

“I didn’t think blonde and bitchy was your type,” Penelope says, smirking, when he turns back around. He flinches at her words, having forgotten that she was standing there. She looks much too amused for her own good. 

“It’s not,” Landon protests, but it sounds half-hearted even to himself. Penelope laughs, an evil, scheming laugh, and Landon’s body goes into panic mode as he watches her saunter away. What has he gotten himself into?

 

* * *

 

“I’m bored,” Lizzie sighs, flopping down on her bed. In fact, she has two essays two write, one of which is a history paper about the effect of the witch trials on Mystic Falls, but she just can’t bring herself to do it. She needs to feel _productive_ , not dumber than she actually is. It doesn’t help that she’d seen Hope in the kitchen earlier bragging about how she’d already finished her own essay, as well as all of the homework for the week after that. After hearing Hope speak, Lizzie had almost wanted to put off doing work out of spite.

“What do you want me to do about it?” Josie asks, uncharacteristically angry at her. Lizzie pays it no mind. She’s good at compartmentalizing. When Josie’s ready, she’ll tell her about it. 

A charity case, that’s what Lizzie needs. She needs something to get her mind off of life—her life, specifically, and how boring and shitty it is at the moment, with dad constantly running around on missions with Hope—and after last week’s interaction, she knows exactly who to take on.

 

* * *

 

She finds Landon, unsurprisingly, at the library. He’s such a little nerd, with all of his sci-fi references and his movie obsession. Lizzie can’t remember the last time she’s ever even watched a movie, with all of the endless tragedies that the Salvatore School is plagued with. Who has time for a romp into town proper when there are monsters attacking them at every available opportunity? She’s almost, like, vaguely jealous of him, that he got to live his normal human life before being dragged into the supernatural world. Some of them never had the privilege.

But anyway. She’s sick of him moping, and she’s sick of Hope and Rafael ( _beyond_ sick), especially because she had Rafael first. Which obviously doesn’t matter, because it was a fluke. Lizzie’s never anyone’s first choice, she should have known that. Even with Rafael, she was competing against a dead girl, and there’s no way she can ever compete against Hope. She’d tried that when she was younger; all it ever lead to was tears and heartbreak. 

She slides into the chair next to him and enjoys when his eyes widen and he takes his headphones out of his ears to look at her. “Hey, Curly.” His eyes narrow. 

“What do you want?” he asks, obviously still puzzled. Lizzie Saltzman doesn’t just talk to anyone, even he knows that. 

She grins at him, malicious and excited and giddy all at once. It’s an odd combination, but it works for her. Landon hates it. “I have a proposition for you,” she explains, laying her hands out on the table. They’re empty, but it’s all about the drama of the presentation, you know? 

Landon narrows his eyes. “Okay?” He says it as a question, not like a response. 

Lizzie sighs. She knew this would be like pulling teeth, but she didn’t think it would be this hard. “I want to get you and Hope back together,” she says. Landon snorts. 

“Not happening.”

“You haven’t even heard my plan yet!”

“Trust me: she doesn’t want me back.”

“But do you want her back?” _Please say yes_ , Lizzie thinks. _I need her to stop being so high and mighty all the time_. Maybe if Hope and Landon got back together, Hope would finally admit that she’s able to make mistakes, and then Lizzie would stop getting lectures from her dad about her own. 

Landon’s eyes are unreadable. She has no idea what he’s thinking. Lizzie thought that he’d absolutely jump at the chance at getting Hope back; who wouldn’t? She’s the golden girl of the Salvatore School. Hell, she’s the golden girl of the entire fucking universe, at least if you asked anyone around here. Why doesn’t Landon want her back? 

“Okay, sure,” Landon says, which is a less enthusiastic response than Lizzie was hoping for. But still, it was an affirmative response, and that was all she needed. “What’s your plan?” 

Lizzie practically squeals, sitting up straighter in her chair. “Well first of all, we’re going to have to give you a makeover. No more leather jackets, they’re a cliche. And we’re going to have to do something about this hair.” Lizzie pauses for a second, reaches up to run a hand through his messy curls. They’re softer than she expected, but she doesn’t want to think about it. She has to stay focused. 

Landon, on the other hand, thinks he’s losing his mind. He’s never been this close to Lizzie, face to face. He thinks he’s having a brain aneurysm. She’s touching his _hair_. Did he die and end up living one of his pathetic, embarrassing, shameful dreams? One of those ones where he wakes up panting and sweating, having had thought about Lizzie for a little bit too long right before bed, only slightly against his will?

How is he supposed to tell her that he doesn’t actually want Hope back, that he’s happy for Rafael, and that he’d never be able to do that to his own brother? He can’t, so he just sits in silence and listens to Lizzie’s plan, hoping that he can just convince her that he’s too cowardly to actually talk to Hope, and not that he’s just unwilling to do so. 

(And if he’s being honest with himself, Lizzie’s hand in his hair is probably the nicest thing that he’s felt in a really, really long time.)

 

* * *

 

Lizzie has dimples. Landon’s never noticed it before, because she smiles so rarely; she just smirks instead, and that’s not the same. And anyway, her dimples aren’t as prominent when she does that as when she smiles. He hadn’t truly been paying attention that day in the library, but now that Landon’s seen them, it’s the only thing that he can think about. His nights are spent devising ways that he can make her smile, and his days are spent hating himself because he can’t work up the courage to do it. Landon doesn’t know what his type is, but he’s starting to think it might be girls that hate him. He honestly has no idea what to do about that.

 

* * *

 

Lizzie’s the last person that Landon expects to be a night owl. If anything, he’d thought she’d be one of those girls that demanded her eight hours (or more) a night, insisting on her beauty sleep. But the longer he stays at the Salvatore School, the more he realizes that maybe he never knew what Lizzie was like at all. 

Take last week, for example. He’d been having another sleepless night, made worse by the fact that Hope dumped him for his brother (he’s not going to think about it, he’s not going to think about it, he’s _not_ ), and he’d wandered down to the kitchens to make himself a sandwich, or find a snack, or shove ice cream into his face, or something. 

He’d expected it to be empty, of course, because it was 3 am and he had the worst sleep schedule on the planet. Instead, he’d found Lizzie Saltzman, wearing a hoodie and the smallest pair of shorts he’s ever seen in his life (it’s not like he likes her or anything, but _Jesus_ , he’s a teenage boy) also eating a sandwich. 

He’d started, practically jumping a foot when he saw her there, sitting on the counter with absolutely no care in the world, legs crossed and eating chips with a (seemingly homemade) bowl of guacamole. He really had expected her to yell at him, to tell him to get out and mind his own business, because this was her parents’ school and he was an interloper, blah blah. But instead, she’d simply cocked an eyebrow at him and slid the bowl of guac over, no questions asked. 

It was silly, but he’d felt something shift in him that night, some fundamental part of him that started to understand that maybe Lizzie wasn’t all that bad. They’d sat like that, seemingly for hours, just sitting in silence and eating chips. It was actually… kind of nice. 

The same thing is happening now. His insomnia, that is, not the eating chips. He couldn’t sleep again, because every time he closed his eyes his brain would conjure the most terrifying images of a woman aiming a gun at him, of monsters coming up from his sink drain, of Dr. Saltzman walking in on him and Hope making out (deep, disgusting shudder). 

So he’d done the sensible thing. Kidding; he’d done the _Landon_ thing, and went out to the lake that he’d christened in his head as his and Hope’s spot. All he wanted to do was sit there and remember her and wallow, but of course life wouldn’t let him do that.

He sits down, fully ready to have a good cry, and the second he lets out his first sigh who else but Lizzie Saltzman materializes next to him. This time he actually does jump, almost falling into the lake as he tries to understand how the hell she could move so quietly so as to not be visible to him. 

She rolls her eyes, of course. “It would’ve been awkward just sitting here watching you cry,” Lizzie says, shrugging her shoulders. “I didn’t want to just sit there and watch it.” He’s still not understanding. “I spelled myself invisible,” she clarifies further. “I don’t like sitting out here where anyone can just see me. And it’s just good for general safety, you know.” She shrugs again, then points at herself. “Witch.” Pauses for a second. “Not, like, a really good one, but. Whatever.” 

She’s rambling. Landon doesn’t think he’s ever seen her this thrown off her game. In the moonlight and from the reflection of the lake he can almost swear that he sees tear marks on her face, maybe even a little puffiness around the eyes, but he’s obviously not going to say anything. 

So he starts talking instead, hoping to maybe make her feel better, or maybe just for himself. He just can’t take the silence. “I keep having crazy dreams,” he says, and Lizzie turns to look at him. He expects her to make a snarky comment, but she doesn’t, surprising him again for what feels like the millionth time. (Landon thinks that he’ll never understand women for as long as he lives.) “About my mom. I don’t even know what she looked like, but I keep having dreams of her dying. Almost like I’ve lived it, but I know I haven’t. Like it’s… like it’s some sort of alternate reality.”

(Lizzie doesn’t know how they both seem to be going through the same things always at the same time, or how it’s like Landon always knows what she’s thinking. But she’s also been having some crazy dreams lately, about alternate realities and life without Josie and life with Josie but without Hope, and she doesn’t know what to do with them. So instead she just changes the subject, because she’s so confused by what Landon Kirby is doing to her that she doesn’t even want to think about it.) 

“Did you know her?” Lizzie asks. Her eyes are dark, and he’s not sure what it means. He realizes that he doesn’t really know anything about her. It’s not like Hope ever specifically told him things; it was more like he just figured stuff out as he went along, always the bumbling fool. “I never knew my biological mom. She died before I was born.” 

Landon wants to ask further, but he just answers her question instead. “She gave me up. I don’t think I have a single clear memory of her, besides this picture that I used to carry around of us. I don’t even know where I put it, which kills me, because I used to carry it around every day.” He waits a second. “How did she die?” 

Lizzie snorts, but she still looks like she’s on the verge of tears. “My uncle, her twin brother, killed her. On her and dad’s wedding day, isn’t that sick? I guess I know where I get half of my personality from.” 

“That’s not true,” Landon immediately says. “You’re not a murderer.”

“Aren’t I?” Lizzie snaps back. “How would you know?”

“How would _you_? Have you ever killed anyone?” 

She’s silent. “Not yet.” 

“And you won’t. Anyway, don’t you still have a mom? A… another one?”

Lizzie’s mouth curls up at the side. _God_ , those dimples. “I guess we have more in common than I thought, Curly, because I also have an absentee mother. Her name’s Caroline Forbes, and I love her, even if she loves to ignore me.”

Landon laughs, a surprised, throaty sound that escapes him against his will. “You do _not_ have an absentee mother,” he says. “Didn’t she just take you guys to Europe?”

“You’re right,” Lizzie shrugs. “I just need a lot of attention.” He laughs again at that, and he thinks that maybe a night laughing at Lizzie Saltzman’s sardonic jokes is a lot better than the one he planned for himself of crying all alone by the lake that he used to sit at with his ex-girlfriend.

 

* * *

 

Raf is… well, confused, mostly. He’d noticed Landon spending more and more time with Lizzie lately, and he’d confronted his brother about it, although not entirely in the most confrontational way. Rafael had found him hanging out in the courtyard reading, and had sat down next to him and straight out asked, “What’s going on with you and Lizzie?”

Landon knows what happened between his brother and Lizzie after he left, and yet… it’s not entirely turning him off. Especially because he’s seen Raf with Hope more often than not lately. 

He doesn’t even know how to really respond to that question, besides saying, “We’re just hanging out. Studying and… stuff.”

“Studying,” Rafael repeats. “You know how that sounds, right?” 

Landon nods, but he’s quick to qualify: “It’s not like that, honest. I just… really, actually like spending time with her.” Rafael looks suspicious at that, and Landon doesn’t blame him. Until he’d broken up with Hope, he hadn’t realized how overlooked Lizzie was. It was like the girl was screaming and no one was paying attention. But once he started paying attention, it was like he couldn’t look away. 

“She’s actually not that bad,” Landon says. He doesn’t even know how to explain it fully himself. “Once you get to know her, I mean. She’s… surprisingly compassionate, and funny, and she has this thing about olives that I don’t really get. I mean, they’re an okay vegetable, or—fruit? Olives have seeds, are they…?” 

Rafael is looking at Landon like he’s crazy, and the truth is, maybe he is. Maybe all of this shit about the supernatural and Hope and everything has finally made him crack, or it’s all some sort of fever dream that he can’t put together, and he’s just hallucinating a very blonde, very perky girl into existence. “Look, man, I don’t know what’s going on with you two, but, Lizzie’s kind of intense. I don’t want you to give her the wrong idea like I did, because god knows I regret it.” 

“Yeah,” Landon says, looking across the lawn. Lizzie’s there with Pedro, leaning down to help him with some sort of flower, her mouth curved up into a genuine smile, their hands working in tandem to make something grow where there was barely a weed before. And he thinks that maybe, just maybe, underneath all of that venom Lizzie Saltzman is a really nice person.

 

* * *

 

They meet in the library all the time now, and not always to talk about Hope. Landon can tell how much it bothers Lizzie, which is why he can’t understand why she wanted to stick to this plan anyway. Instead, he tries to get her to talk about herself, about anything other than his ex. It’s crazy how much she opens up when she actually wants to, and how vulnerable and kind she is when they’re not talking about Hope. 

They had been talking about his mother, again, and then her own. She’d gone quiet for a minute, and then had blurted, “People just don’t get it.” He’d raised an eyebrow in reply, making her huff. She looked so adorable like this, in sweats and a plain t-shirt, a look that he’s sure not a lot of people get to see her in. “You don’t know what it’s like to be everybody’s second choice.” 

Landon snorts at that. “Are you kidding? Do you know how many foster homes I’ve been in? How many people I’ve been abandoned by? My own _mother_ ,” he finishes dramatically, overemphasizing and actually, surprisingly, making Lizzie laugh. 

She snorts, wiping a tear that had escaped off of her cheek and leaning into his side. It’s weirdly comforting to have her by his side like this. (Lizzie had never actually had a freak-out _in front_ of anyone before, and he knew it. She’s gotten angry and yelled, sure, but usually she storms away and finds a quiet place to let out her anger and sadness. This is… well, it’s _helping_ , which is new.) “You’re right,” she says quietly. “Guess I forgot who I was talking to.” 

Landon’s arm is wrapped around her, and his warm, callused hand rubs her arm gently, up and down in a soothing motion. It’s strange, but her head feels weirdly at place tucked into his shoulder, with his chin resting on top of it. “Look at us,” he murmurs quietly. “The rejects.” 

Lizzie rolls her eyes, but knowing he can’t see it, mutters “Speak for yourself” instead. 

“And here I was, thinking we were bonding.” 

“Don’t push your luck, Curly.”

 

* * *

 

He doesn’t know how they end up here. One second they’re walking down the hallway, Lizzie ribbing him for something or other, and the next he sees Hope out of the corner of his eye and panics. Landon grabs Lizzie’s arm and tugs her into the nearest hallway closet, praying that it’snot a maintenance closet, because he knows how Lizzie feels about dirt.

“What the hell?” she hisses, struggling out of his grip and reaching towards the doorknob. Landon doesn’t let her go, instead shoving a hand over her mouth and panicking even more when her eyes widen. He can tell she’s so close to biting his hand off, so he whispers a fake explanation. 

“I thought I saw something. New monster. Are you going to scream, or can I take my hand back?” She narrows her eyes, which he takes to mean yes. He takes his hand off her mouth, moving it towards her shoulder instead. Her shirt had slit down to reveal one bra strap, and fuck if it’s not the most erotic thing he’s ever seen in his entire life. Unfortunately blonde and bitchy _is_ his type. 

“What do you mean, another monster?” she asks. “Are you sure you saw something?” Absolutely, he did, but he doesn’t want to tell her that what he saw was Hope, and that he didn’t want Lizzie to go tell him to talk to her, because what he really wanted to do was spend time with Lizzie instead. 

“I’m sure. Let’s just stay in here for a sec.”

“Okay,” she says, but he can tell she’s not entirely convinced. It’s not like her to stay quiet for so long. He can tell that she’s getting impatient because she’s practically squirming underneath his gaze, and all of a sudden the room feels too hot and he really wants to take off his jacket (and maybe her top, too, but he’s trying not to focus on it). “Landon.” She’s whispering. It’s really doing things for him. “What’s going on?” 

He doesn’t answer, just places his other hand against the wall and leans into her. “Landon,” she says again, this time higher pitched and with a shakier voice. 

“Lizzie,” he’s says, and he can’t stop himself now. He keeps whispering her name, over and over, his mouth moving down to latch onto her neck. “Liz. You’re so pretty.” His mouth is at her throat, and he still won’t stop talking. And Lizzie needs him to shut up because all she can think about when he’s telling her that she’s pretty is how he wanted Hope first, he thought Hope was pretty first, he’s lying, because Lizzie is a twig and she hates herself and she has no boobs and—

He’s _still_ talking. Lizzie wants to slap him. “Shut _up_ ,” she pants. She can’t do this if she can’t stop thinking about how Landon did this with Hope, about Landon’s hands on Hope, Landon enjoying it more with Hope than he does with her. 

She had told Rafael not to talk when they had sex more for his benefit, because she thought it was what she wanted and if she could just get it, she could get him, she’d finally be happy. (She’d thought that’s what she wanted, anyway: a boyfriend, someone new and exciting, someone who never had a chance to choose someone else over her. So much for that. He’d picked her anyway, and now they’re happier than ever. She wishes all the best for Hope and Rafael and their litter.)

This time, though, she needs Landon to be quiet for _her_. Because she’s going to lose her nerve if he keeps pretending that she actually likes her, that this actually means something, when they both know it doesn’t. 

“I can’t,” Landon says, pulling back to look at her. “I can’t do it without talking.” 

Lizzie’s this close to rolling her eyes. “What does that even _mean_? It’s just sex, Landon. You don’t have to convince me of anything.” His hips involuntarily move against hers when she says the word _sex_. He thought he’d been lucky to kiss her, at most. 

“You don’t really mean that.” God, she hates his eyes. His stupid, stupid puppy dog eyes. He constantly looks like he’s on the verge of tears, which is incidentally how Lizzie feels all the time, but at least she can keep control of herself in front of others. (For the most part, okay. She’s working on it.) 

What Lizzie wants most in the world is to be someone’s first choice, just once. For someone to look at her and want her first, not Hope Mikaelson, not anyone else. Her. Elizabeth Saltzman, every single last bit of her. “I can’t do it if I’m not your first choice,” she tells him, and he’s already nodding, leaning back down to kiss her.

“You are,” he says. “I promise.” And then he kisses her again. 

 

* * *

 

It might’ve started as a way to get back at Hope. Who else could he make her jealous with besides her worst enemy in the world? But now… now for the first time in what seems like forever, Landon’s first thought when Dr. Saltzman goes missing isn’t about Hope, it’s about Lizzie, and how he has to find her immediately, because she must be going crazy not knowing what’s going on. 

He finds her crying in the library that has become a second home to him for all the time they’ve spent there. Months of Lizzie attempting to get Hope to fall back in love with him had made Landon fall in love with her instead. The thought strikes him suddenly, like a slap in the face, which is no coincidence because every moment with Lizzie simultaneously feels like coming home and like being smacked.

She’s sitting at one of the wooden tables in the room (the one she had met him at to go over their plan what seems like years ago), her head buried in her hands. He can hear her crying, just like he had that first time he’d found this library. His hands itch to reach out and touch her, to place a hand on her shoulder and ease her pain, because it’s cutting him up inside. 

“Liz,” he says warily, watching as her head snaps up. Her eyes are rimmed red and her cheeks are puffy, and Landon is stunned by how someone can still look so fierce while they’re literally breaking down. She's not even wearing one of her usual iterations of the uniform: no pretty skirt, nothing in her hair, no fun and flirty top. That's how he knows she's really been going through it. 

“Don’t start, Landon,” she whispers, her voice hoarse. “I can’t deal with this right now.” Her hands are twisting inside themselves over and over, and he grabs them in his own, stroking his thumbs against her hands. 

“I’m here for you,” Landon says. “You don’t have to go through this alone.” 

Lizzie’s blue eyes are stormy when she extricates herself from her chair to stand up and glare at him. “You have no idea what it’s like,” she snaps, stabbing a finger into his chest. His heart is thumping a mile a minute, and he wants her to hear it, to take pity on him, to take a bite out of it. _Do whatever you want to me_ , his heart is saying. _I’ll take it_. 

“Explain it to me.” 

“You don’t know what it’s like when my own father goes missing and all that anyone cares about it is how _Hope_ is going to take it. Like he’s her dad, not mine. Or _worse_ , how it feels when people make comments about Hope and dad’s relationship as if I don’t hear it. I never want to hear the words _extra credit_ ever again.” 

“They do not say that,” Landon starts, but Lizzie rolls her eyes. Amazing how she can still do that when there are still tears rolling down her cheeks. 

“You forget,” Lizzie says, “I have spies everywhere.” Somehow Landon managed to take the arm pointing at him and lower it down by her side, and both of his hands have come up to stroke Lizzie’s arms, gently moving up and down on either side. It’s hot in the library but they’re both shivering. Lizzie’s wearing a sweater and she has goosebumps, and both of their chests are heaving. 

Landon moves his right hand up to her face until his fingers curl gently under her chin, and Lizzie can’t take it, she can’t, because she knows that this isn’t hers to have. Why does she always fall for the ones who don’t want her back? His eyes don’t flutter closed. He just keeps looking at her as his soft mouth inches closer and closer to her own, and only when she succumbs and closes her eyes does she assume that his follow suit. 

It’s so much nicer than when she’d kissed Rafael, and so different than that time in the closet when she’d been out of her mind with fear, but she doesn’t want to think about that. She doesn’t want to regret it, even if he does. Instead, Lizzie focuses on learning the way that Landon kisses, out here in the open and with the daylight shining down on them, because she knows she’ll never have it again. 

The thing about Lizzie is that she’s always wanted, more than anything, a real, true love. A love that makes her feel safe, and happy, and like the best version of herself. And she had been, these past few weeks, with Landon. With this boy who is kissing her so gently as if she might break, as if he’s going to ruin it, like he doesn’t want her to run away.

And then Lizzie’s brain does what it’s best at: panics. What about Hope? Hadn’t Landon been madly in love with her a few weeks ago? What about that? Does he jump through girls this quickly? What is she doing? 

She wrenches herself away, wiping her tears frantically with the backs of her hands. “What am I to you people?” she hisses, unable to even muster up her usual volume. “Am I a joke to you? A dare?”

“Lizzie, what—what are you talking about?”

“Did Rafael put you up to this?” Am I just a piece of meat that they’re going to pass between each other? “Did Hope?”

“Lizzie, it’s not—it’s not about Hope.” Landon’s eyes are flashing like she’s never seen them, and Lizzie wonders at the fact that he doesn’t have any powers whatsoever. They would suit him, even now, even like this. 

Lizzie laughs, and it’s the worst thing either of them have ever heard. “You and I both know that’s bullshit. Everything’s always about Hope.” Whether I like it or not, she doesn’t add. “Tell me that you don’t still have feelings for her. That you wouldn’t drop me in a heartbeat the second she came running back.” Landon says nothing, just runs a finger over his bottom lip. _Say something_ , she wants to scream at him. _Fight for me_. 

“You can’t, can you?” Everyone in Lizzie’s life chooses Hope over her. She’s tired of being surprised by it.

She doesn’t know when it happened with Landon, but it just did. In the midst of desperately searching for a boyfriend, someone to want her, Lizzie had managed to stumble upon something that was real. It wasn’t forced, and it wasn’t manufactured. It was awkward and fumbling and real, and now she had ruined it all, because he’s not saying anything and he still loves Hope and she’s an _idiot_. 

“Lizzie,” Landon says instead, “I told you I was here for _you_. I don’t know how to say it any better than that.” 

“Don’t lie,” Lizzie says. “I told you I can’t handle it right now.”

“Be my girlfriend,” Landon blurts. She does that to him, makes him say things without thinking, makes him give himself up to her on a silver platter. Surprisingly, her cheeks go pink and her eyes go wide, and it’s enough to drive a guy insane. 

“Really?” she asks. “But I thought—”

“Listen to me,” he says. “I don’t want to be with Hope anymore. I thought I did, but after a while it was just an excuse for me to spend time with you. You don’t have to worry about her, okay? I want _you_.” 

Lizzie doesn’t know what to do with this information. Instead, she chooses to believe Landon when he says that he wants her, and only her. It’s all that she’s ever wanted, and she’s going to believe it, for now, because that’s all that she can do. Instead of freaking out, she leans in and kisses Landon again, needing to solidify for herself that he’s here, he’s real, and he wants her. And maybe that’s enough, to know that he chose her not because he saw her first, but because he really wanted to. Maybe she wasn't his first choice, but that's not what matters anymore. What matters is that someone chose her over Hope for the first time in her life, and he really, really means it. 

**Author's Note:**

> anyway i love bargain basement dair  
> (also if this seems disjointed it's because i didn't want to add more scenes to it because if i did i wouldn't be able to stop myself and it would become novel length and i just don't have the time for that). but i haven't posted anything in ages and i just need to let myself post things that aren't perfect or else i'll never write again lmfao. also didn't proofread this lmfao yolo hashtag living life on the edge !


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